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THE TRAVELS OP 

HONK- A-TONK 



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Honk-a-Tonk paced back and forth to warn off all 
intruders ’ ’ 

— Page 7 



THE TRAVELS OF 


HONK-A-TONK 

AND OTHER STORIES 


BY 

ALLEN CHAFFEE 

Author of 

“The Adventures of Twinkly Eyes, the Little Black Bear,” 
“Trail and Tree-Top,” “Lost River, or The Adven- 
tures of Two Boys in the Big Woods,” and “The 
Adventures of Fleet Foot and Her Fawns” 


ILLUSTRATIONS BY 

PETEE DA RU 



J > » 


MILTON BRADLEY COMPANY 
Springfield, Massachusetts 
1921 



Copyright, 1921, by 
MILTON BRADLEY COMPANY 
Springfield, Mass. 

The Travels of Honk-a-Tonk 


JAN 31 lS2i 


Bradlg^Qialitj) Books 

Children*' 

0)CU605643 


CONTENTS 


The Adventures op Honk-A-Tonk 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I The Feathered Aeroplane 1 

II Branta and the Goslings 10 

III Honk-A-Tonk at the Valley Farm . . 14 

Adventures op Shirr Chipmunk .... 27 

The Bird’s Cafeteria 47 

Frisky, the Red Fox Pup 60 

The Trials of Shadow Tail 74 

A Squirrel’s Paradise 87 

Kreek the Pheasant Cock 


95 



THE TRAVELS OF 
HONK-A-TONK 


I 

THE FEATHERED AEROPLANE 

All summer lie had been preparing for the 
long journey to the Southland. 

From the time he first chipped through 
the green- white shell, on their islet on Anti- 
costi, and had made his first unsteady little 
flight into the sedgy shallows, he had been 
told of the migration in which he was to join 
or be left behind, when autumn chilled their 
little paradise of plenty. 

He had grown like the weeds he lived on, 
till now he was as handsome a wild goose as 
could be found on the St. Lawrence, — ^was 
Honk-a-tonk, the gray gander. 

Every day now the skies were cut by flying 
wedges that streamed across the sun, trum- 
1 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


peting their mellow ^‘Honk-honk, honk-a- 
tonk-a-tonk.’’ The sound filled him with a 
wild unrest, a desire to be on the way, — just 
where he did not know, so long as it was on 
the Great Adventure. 

Then one day it came, — ^the call to join 
ranks behind his mother, who, in her widow- 
hood (his father had been captured by a 
fox), had decided to follow several of her 
neighbors who were now ready to go South. 

It wasn’t the easiest thing in the world 
for the young geese to get started in that 
V-shaped formation that would leave each 
member of the group an outlook unimpeded. 

They had to begin their fiight with a little 
jump into the air. As they mounted slowly 
above the swell of the ground air, where it 
was so hard to keep one’s balance, they 
worked their wings with a screw-like action 
that formed figure eights as they struck the 
air. Downward and forward, then upward 
and forward, alternately, went their huge 
propellers, for all the world like those of an 
aeroplane. 

(Indeed, are not the feathered folk the 

2 


THE TRAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


Divine Pattern on which man has modeled 
his flying apparatus 

It was easier going, higher up. The mat- 
ter of balance and control having become a 
habit, at least in fair weather, Honk-a- 
tonk now had time to see how the earth looks 
from on high. Fields, farms and forests, 
rivers and roadways, and far off to the left, 
the ragged white line that divided sea and 
shore, lay spread beneath him. — Or rather, 
so fast was his flight that the scenery gave 
the illusion of racing toward him. 

Then came a stiff air current, and for 
awhile he had all he could do to manage his 
body, wings and tail. Once he and those of 
his brothers and' sisters who flew at the rear 
of the wedge were struck by an unexpected 
gust of wind that sent them off on a tail- 
spin, and it was just about all their lives 
were worth to recover their balance. After 
that Honk-a-tonk kept a weather eye out 
for aerial whirlpools. 

Now they came to a smooth down current 
that required no more effort than coasting. 
3 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


That rested their wings against the next 
emergency. 

Next they came to a wide stretch of sandy 
beach on which the sun beat hotly, and the 
air was rising in an up-grade current that 
made it possible to soar into the cloudless 
blue. 

They passed gulls sailing like kites above 
the cliffs, up whose sides rushed a continual 
draft. Then the chill of the ocean, and its 
aerial down-current, brought them coasting 
down so close to the shore line that Honk-a- 
tonk could see Mother Carey’s Chickens 
gliding up and down, up and down, as they 
rose in the tiny drafts that rebound from the 
water along the swell of each successive 
wave. 

Thus passed the first day. Sunset found 
the little flock volplaning in a long spiral 
glide to the surface of a tide-water pond, 
which seemed to rise sickeningly to meet 
them, till they struck with a muffled whirring 
of their great gray wings and a glittering 
splash. 

Honk-a-tonk was ravenous, for he had been 
4 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


traveling on high speed all afternoon. So 
were the neighbor flocks, which had kept 
close all day, calling merrily back and forth 
with their varied ^^KVonks.” 

My, what quantities of pond weed, what 
bushels of wild rice, what salads of wild cel- 
ery, what thousands upon thousands of grass 
roots and weed seeds they managed to con- 
sume, before the edge was taken off their 
appetites. Then how they bathed and prinked 
and gabbled, and curtesied to one another, 
and preened their feathers that all might 
be in ship shape for the morrow ! But with 
the coming of the night, they dropped sound 
asleep standing up, and slept till nearly sun- 
rise. 

The next day they passed a flock of Black- 
polls, and flew side by side for a little way, 
exchanging greetings. The Black-polls ex- 
plained that they had been nesting in Labra- 
dor, and were now heading South for a win- 
ter in Brazil. They would fly via Key West, 
Jamaica and the coast of South America. 
The gray geese marvelled that these tiny 
warblers would travel seven thousand miles. 
5 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


‘‘Why do you go so far*?” asked Honk-a- 
tonk. 

“Labrador freezes. Ho food — ^no food — 
snow and cold — snow and cold!’^ they an- 
swered him in a chorus. ‘ ‘ Zwe-zwe-ee-ee-ee ! ’ ’ 

“Then why don’t you stay in the South?” 

“Oh, but you don’t know the Labrador 
summers! — Such feasting — such feasting — 
such feasting! Mosquitoes that thick you 
could eat your fill almost without stirring 
from the spot! It’s the only place to bring 
up a family of children before they’re old 
enough to fend for themselves.” And they 
were off with their vigorous “Zwe-zwe-ee- 
ee-ee.” 

The next day the flock was struck by an 
early snow-squall, and only the sound of 
the breakers on the shore below, and the 
repeated calls of their leader, flying low, 
guided them through the maze of swirling 
white. They passed through that and were 
up among the warmer rain clouds, and 
Honk-a-tonk could see nothing down below 
save gray mists, while the clouds themselves 
6 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


drove by like ships in a tempest. But by 
and by they had passed even these. 

That night they camped on a river whose 
glint they had been following. They dis- 
posed themselves for sleep on the larger of 
the rocks jutting from the rapids, for only 
so would they feel safe, with the woods such 
a fine place for foxes. 

They were just beginning their breakfast 
of wild rice when an orange breasted car- 
rier pigeon, with tail as long as his body, 
landed beside them for a drink, fiapping 
his wings to check the speed of his fall. On 
one leg he wore a silver anklet, bearing his 
number, while tied beneath his chin was 
a tiny message. The geese crowded curiously 
around him, for never before had they seen 
one of his species. 

Can’t stop, can’t stop,” he cooed nerv- 
ously. ‘‘I must get back home as fast as 
ever I can.” 

^‘Nonsense, what is your hurry?” urged 
Honk-a-tonk, who would have enjoyed ques- 
tioning him further. But the pigeon was 
already speeding Westward. 

7 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


must have something mighty impor- 
tant to attend to,” thought the youthful 
gander. 

That day the streaks of white they had 
seen at sunrise developed into icy winds that 
howled in the upper air, and the flocks called 
soundingly back and forth to one another, 
as they rode the bracing breeze. But by the 
morrow they had left the winds behind, and 
to their nostrils came the warm earth smells 
of the Southern state over which they were 
then traveling. Honk-a-tonk soon came to 
know the weather signs. 

Sometimes they had to sleep in a patter 
of rain ; but they minded not at all, so won- 
derfully did their oily feathers shed the 
drops. Sometimes they passed a flock of 
tame geese, — ^big, white, stupid fellows. 
How they jeered at them! And once the 
little gander on the end of the line just 
escaped a weasel. 

They had a dreadful time getting by a 
swamp where hunters brought down two of 
their number. But for the most part, the 
trip passed happily enough. 

8 


THE TRAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


Thus by easy stages, past plains and moun- 
tain peaks, they sailed the skies, till winter 
found them on the rich lagoons of the Gulf 
of Mexico, resting for the return flight in the 
spring. 


9 


II 


BRANTA AND THE GOSLINGS 

The Northward trip was even more delight- 
ful, because no mishap befell anyone at the 
hands of hunters. 

Summer found the flock once more on 
their isle at Anticosti, where the younger 
generation spent long, blissful hours feast- 
ing and fattening, and racing one another 
in air and water. 

It was not till their second trip to the 
South had been accomplished and the flocks 
(now the larger for last year’s brood), 
had once more returned to the land 
of plenty, that something very wonderful 
happened to Honk-a-tonk. 

That was the wooing and winning of 
Branta, the belle of all Anticosti (or so, at 
least, it seemed to Honk-a-tonk). 

Canada geese are faithful lovers, and 
when once their little home in the reeds has 
10 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


been established, it is a certainty that the 
l^PPy P^ out their allotted 

two score years and ten together, — if no ill 
befalls from fox or other enemy. Indeed, 
Branta assured him with many a caress of 
her sleek head against his feathered throat, 
that even should he die, never would she 
mate with any other, and his assurances 
were equally ardent, as he stood guard while 
she brooded the nest among the reeds. 

June filled the grassy nest with seven of 
the most adorable bits of goslings that ever 
broke the shell. How proudly Branta led 
them into the shallows, where they followed 
without fear, while Honk-a-tonk paced back 
and forth to warn off all intruders. How 
cunningly they dipped and paddled, just like 
Mother! And how fast they grew up in the 
likeness of the great gray gander! 

Honk-a-tonk ’s feathery chest swelled with 
pride as he watched the little fellows learn- 
ing berry and leaf and bud, running awk- 
wardly after their mother, gabbling, gab- 
bling, gabbling their small affairs. 

Later they began preparing for the long 
11 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


migration that would try their wings that 
fall. They must be well drilled, because if 
they proved unfit to keep up with the flocks, 
they would have to be left behind. The weak- 
lings — if such there proved to be — ^would 
never survive to hand on their defects to 
future generations. 

Every day they must make a practice 
flight, singing to the rhythm of their wing 
strokes to keep in line. Now they tried a 
night flight, by the full of the moon — for one 
could never tell what emergency might arise. 
And now they must follow their leader 
through the fog. For Branta was taking no 
chances, so far as their schooling was con- 
cerned. 

IJsually they slept in the marsh on 
some reedy islet where no fox could And 
them. Once an otter, swimming out to them 
at sunset, drove them into a tree. And al- 
ways they had to keep a weather eye out for 
hawks, diving deep and swimming with only 
their nostrils out, till the marauder had 
caught some other prey, and passed them 
by. But thanks to their unceasing vigilance, 
12 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


the summer passed, and still the goslings 
numbered seven. 

Then came that wild clarion ringing down 
the air that meant the fall migration, and 
feathered voyagers swept across the au- 
tumn sky, sounding their sonorous honk, as 
the clans gathered over the hundred miles of 
Anticosti. Prom ponds, marshes, isles and 
tidal swamps, from shoals and inland 
streams, they mounted in long, swinging 
spirals, chanting till the heavens rang : 

^^We’reoff! We’re off! We’re off to the 
Southland, hurray, hurray!” 

And racing past them came flocks of Arc- 
tic Terns, with their red bills and feet and 
their forked white tails, calling their brisk 
^^Tee-arr, tee-arr!” 

Came Golden Plover (black beneath), 
loons, and ducks of all degrees. Such a babel 
of bird voices — calling back and forth to 
keep their flocks together — ^never was heard 
before, — or so it seemed to Honk-a-tonk, his 
yellow eyes gleaming with rightful pride in 
his seven gray geese and Branta, as they 
formed for flight. 


13 


Ill 


HONK-A-TONK AT THE VALLEY FARM 

The Hired Man lay at full length behind 
a bush, gun in hand, and waited. Pecking 
contentedly enough at the end of her tether, 
one of the fat white geese from the Valley 
Farm cocked a weather eye at the heavens. 

Suddenly a mellow ^‘Honk, honk, honk-a- 
tonk-a-tonk’’ caused the Man to shift his 
position till his gun pointed straight at the 
clouds. 

The Barnyard Goose, to whom the sound 
meant, ^‘We’re off to the Southland, we’re 
off to the Southland,” lifted his wings as if 
he would like to join the wedge that now 
streamed across the sky. 

On they came, the long-necked wild geese, 
their bodies seeming like two lines of large 
gray dots arranged in the letter V. 

‘‘Honk, honk!” called the Barnyard Goose. 
“Wait for me, wait for me !” 

14 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


The leader of the flock swept lower to see 
who this was with lifted wings and plead- 
ing voice. The fanning of the many wings 
now reached the ears of the Man behind 
the bush, and his finger tightened on the 
trigger. 

‘ ‘ Oh, wait, I ’m coming ! ’ ’ honked the Barn- 
yard Goose, raising his fat body on unac- 
customed wings. But the string about his 
leg brought him back to earth with a jerk. 

Then ‘‘Crack ! went the gun, and the mid- 
dle bird on the right-hand side of the V went 
circling out of line, flapping with one wing 
only, the other hanging useless. His flight 
became more and more erratic as he dropped 
behind the flock, finally turning him over 
and over in a series of aerial somersaults. 
A despairing honk told the leader of the 
flock that Honk-a-tonk was no longer in the 
running. 

Slowly, slowly he settled to the ground, 
almost at the feet of the decoy. 

“Hello, there!’’ the Barnyard Goose ex- 
claimed, hurrying to greet him. “Awfully 
glad to see you!” 


15 


THE TRAVELS OP HOJ^K-A-TONK 


But Honk-a-tonk only wailed despair- 
ingly: ‘‘My wing’s broken. I can’t fly. 
They’re going on without me.” 

“Cheer up! You’re in the best barn-yard 
this side the North Woods,” the Barnyard 
Goose assured him. 

“But I want to go South,” wept the wild 
goose. “I want to go on to Florida with 
Branta and my flock!” 

“You’re not going South — ^not this trip,” 
spoke up the Hired Man, quite as if he had 
understood. The next minute the great hand- 
some bird felt a wire noose thrown over his 
injured wing, and he was helpless. 

Honk-a-tonk naturally thought he was go- 
ing to be killed, as the Hired Man tucked him 
under his arm. And my, how his broken wing 
did hurt! 

But fortunately the Boy from the Valley 
Farm came by at this moment. 

“Give him here!” he commanded angrily. 
With understanding fingers he examined 
the aching wing, finally binding the broken 
bone by the aid of a handful of twigs and 
his pocket handkerchief, — ^while Honk-a- 
16 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


tonk, who did not understand, hissed an- 
grily. 

‘‘Hell let you go when your wing heals,” 
the Barnyard Goose assured the newcomer. 
But that was not to be. No sooner had the 
Boy left the pair of them in the barnyard 
and turned his back to get in a few strokes 
at the wood-pile, than the Hired Man got a 
pair of shears and clipped the tips of the 
great gray wings till they could no longer 
lift their owner, — not till the feathers grew 
out again. 

“Never mind,” the Barnyard Goose en- 
couraged. “It isn’t half bad here.” 

But Honk -a -tonk only moped and 
mourned, as he saw one flock after another 
pass trumpeting overhead. 

The flapping of their wings made him flap 
with his poor, useless 'one in his longing to 
be one of them. 

“Now they are going to alight,” he told 
the Barnyard Goose, as the dull red of the 
November sunset sent long dazzling rays 
across the meadows. For one of the passing 
flocks had begun slowly drifting closer to 
17 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


earth and would likely alight a mile further 
on. 

‘‘Now they’ll be settling on the lake to 
feed on eel grass and water lily roots,” he 
continued lonesomely. “I can just imagine 
how merrily they are chattering.” 

“There is no lake down that way, — only 
grain fields,” interrupted the Barnyard 
Goose. 

“Well, then, they must be feeding on the 
scattered grains of wheat and hunting- 
through the com sheaves on the stubble 
field, ’ ’ he insisted. ‘ ‘ Or maybe there ’s some 
of that delicious winter rye, as fresh and 
green as one finds in spring.” 

“But see what we’ve got here,” urged 
the Barnyard Goose. “Come and get ac- 
quainted with my flock and see how snug 
and warm we are going to be all winter!” 
And he led the way to a little shed whence 
issued the sound of meal-time gossip. Honk- 
a-tonk observed that they were all white, 
like the one he had first met. 

“Well, I can’t say I like the turn events 
have taken, but here’s for making the best 
18 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


of things till I find a way of escape,” he 
said to himself ; and he approached politely, 
with many curtesies of his long black neck. 

Would they greet him with angry hisses 
and perhaps fiy at him and peck his eyes 
out? 

Happily, the Barnyard Goose had paved 
the way for his coming, and they met him, 
not with hisses, but with a series of neck- 
bending curtesies like his own. 

^Ht may be comfortable here in the barn- 
yard, but it won’t be the same,” the wild 
goose told himself. ‘‘Branta may be search- 
ing hard for her supper, but I’d prefer plain 
sedge grass, if only I could join her, to the 
best table scraps ever set before me.” And 
with a heavy heart he made his way after 
the Barnyard Goose who had first greeted 
him. 

So long as his great gray wings had been 
clipped till all thought of those rapid miles 
of migration had to be postponed, it was 
certainly a piece of good luck to have landed 
in a place like this. For the geese of the back- 
woods farm had both food and shelter sup- 
19 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


plied them in abundance. And soon he found 
his eyes closing, even against his will, as 
were those of his companions, — for the sun 
had set, and the night chill drew them close 
together. 

Meantime what fate had he ftiissed ? 

The flocks had swept on without him 
through skies of sullen gray, wind-swept and 
icy near the clouds, their wings beating 
rhythmically. Suddenly there was a hissing 
sound behind them, and one of the leaders, 
turning her head, caught sight of a flat- 
headed gos-hawk, — of all winged pirates the 
most powerful and the most bloodthirsty, — 
though so small in stature. The wind 
whistled through his feathers as he sped 
through the air behind them. 

The younger geese at the end of the wedge 
crowded closer together, as if therein lay 
safety, while the older members of the flock 
flew with watchful eyes turned upward at 
their enemy. 

As the gos-hawk reached a point directly 
above the hindermost gosling, his cruel flat 
head stretched downward and his talons 
20 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


spread, ready for a clutch at the tender flesh, 
his cruel eyes gleaming red with blood thirst. 

The great flock swept onward, the leader 
wary-eyed, though honking encouragement 
to those in the rear. 

But now the gos-hawk, fierce and mur- 
derous, hung directly above the hindermost 
young goose. A moment more and he had 
gripped her outstretched neck with his tal- 
ons, and, flap her wings as she might, she 
could not free herself from his clutch. 

Then the full weight of the wounded bird 
began dragging the smaller gos-hawk down, 
despite the wildest flapping of his great, stiff 
wings. For he could not bear up her weight 

Should he let go his supper, or follow it 
down to the top of some tree and there eat 
his fill? Deciding on the latter course, he 
half-folded his huge wings and allowed him- 
self to drop like a parachute, with the goose 
still fast in his talons. 

They fell, with much flapping of their 
two pairs of wings, straight into the top of 
a spruce tree. 

Just there the murderer had a surprise, 
21 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


to understand which we must take a peek 
at Old Man Lynx. 

That crafty freebooter, having left his 
cave some two hours before in search of a 
dinner, had just crept sniffing into a near-* 
by spruce in search of Shadow Tail, the Eed 
Squirrel, whose trail he had been following. 
But Shadow Tail had raced, squeaking 
with terror, to the tip of a branch so slender 
that it would not have upheld the giant cat 
for an instant. The little squirrel was se- 
cure, at least for the moment, — for had the 
lynx attempted to creep out upon his quiv- 
ering victim, the spruce branch would have 
bent double with his weight, if it had not 
broken off. 

The outlook was really far worse for the 
goose, whose Southward flight had been so 
harshly interrupted. For even had the gos- 
hawk’s hold on her slender neck not all but 
killed her, no sooner had they alighted than 
Old Man Lynx began sniffing up at her 
warm, appetizing odor. 

Now the lynx is not considered clever, 
as wild folk go. But with the odor of goose 
22 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


mingled with that of gos-hawk, even before 
he could break through the tangle of boughs 
that blinded him, his nose told him exactly 
what was there. 

He had just enough sense to know that he 
could not take his prize from the hawk with- 
out entering mortal combat with those great 
curved talons. If they did not scratch him 
bald and blind, they would inflict a worse 
injury, well he knew. 

Yes, indeed. Old Man Lynx knew better 
than to attempt to steal a gos-hawk ’s prey 
away from him. He knew the only way to get 
his goose was first to get the hawk. But even 
so, — ^why not.? 

Honk-a-tonk was a heavy sleeper, else 
would his dreams have been disturbed, first 
by the gos-hawk ^s death agony, then by the 
unhappy squawk of a fellow member of the 
flocks on Anticosti, who was not so fortunate 
as to have landed in a backwoods barnyard 
with a broken wing. 

The winter passed, — not so badly save for 
that homesick feeling that kept him longing 
for the spring, and the returning flocks. He 
23 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


met Lop Ear, the spotted hound, and Krek, 
the pheasant cock, — ^who did not migrate, — 
and Shirr Chipmunk, and Shadow Tail, the 
Red Squirrel, and Chick-a-dee, and Frisky, 
the Red Fox Pup, — ^who peered longingly 
0 ’nights through a crack in the poultry pen, 
and licked his chops, and trotted away again. 

And the prisoner told brave tales of his 
fellow migrants — and the Barnyard Goose 
cackled unbelievingly as he described the 
world’s champion flight of the red footed 
Arctic Tern, who nests at the North Pole’s 
brief summer of two months of unceasing 
sunshine, then journeys eleven thousand 
miles to the Antarctic continent for a four 
months’ stay, — ^where again it has twenty- 
four hours of daylight. 

He told of the Golden Plover, who in a 
single flight — ^without pause for food or rest 
— ^makes twenty four hundred miles at one 
stage of its flight, taking the short cut — 
the over-water route — from Nova Scotia to 
South America— though should he fall, he 
could not swim. 

Aud he told of storms that test the bar- 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


diest, and of the instinct that points the way, 
born of the experience — not of themselves 
but of their ancestors, and as much a part of 
their heredity as the color of their wings. 

In return, he learned the little lives of the 
furred and feathered folk about the Valley 
Farm (for each had his story). 

Then one glorious day in early April, 
Honk-a-tonk, his wing healed and his yel- 
low eye scanning each returning flock that 
streamed across the sky, suddenly cocked his 
head on flrst one side, then another. It 
was Branta’s voice, calling, calling, calling 
to the mate she mourned. 

With one mighty effort, he raised the 
great gray wings that had by now grown out 
again (and had, by the Boy’s command, 
been left unclipped) , and leapt into the air. 
Downward and forward, upward and for- 
ward, in flgure eights his long unpractised 
wings pressed back the air, as he balanced, 
every faculty in full control. His muscles 
were stiff from long disuse, but Branta — 
recognizing his agonizing call — sent the 
flock circling around and around till he had 
25 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


joined them; and they were off together to 
the isles of Anticosti. 

And the heavens rang with their joyous, 
‘ ‘ Honk-a-tonk, honk-a-tonk, honk-a-tonk- 
a-tonk!’’ 


26 


THE ADVENTURES OF SHIRR 
CHIPMUNK 


^‘Hey! Look out there, Cousin Chip,” 
barked Shadow Tail, the Red Squirrel, 
as down the Old Logging Road he saw a 
man kneeling with a long stick. 

The man, as Shadow Tail well knew, was 
the Hired Man at the Valley Farm, and the 
black stick spoke thunder. 

^‘Look out Shirr,” he called again, ^^he’s 
looking straight at you!” 

^^Aw, he can’t see so far,” laughed Shirr 
Chipmunk. He whisked out of sight just the 
same, and none too soon, for a heart’s beat 
later a shot rang out on the still autumn air, 
and something heavy zipped past the very 
rock on which the little fellow had been 
sitting. 

‘‘Say, but that was a close shave!” 
squeaked Shadow Tail from his hole in the 
hollow oak. “I declare no one is safe any 
27 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


more. I Ve a good notion to move, and then 
they’ll be sorry, when there’s no one to plant 
nuts for them any more.” 

‘‘Huh! you think you count for a lot in 
this world,” scoffed Shirr, from a crevice 
between two stones. 

“Well, all of us together count a heap, let 
me tell you,” barked Shadow Tail. 

Shirr turned to more important matters. 
Truth to tell, he was worried. It would cer- 
tainly never do to continue living there, now 
that the Hired Man had found him out, for 
his bright eyes had seen much, and he knew 
that there would be no peace till he had 
brought Lop Ear, the Spotted Hound, and 
made an end of him. 

“I just wish I were his size, and he were 
as little as me,” he chirped angrily. “I’d 
chase him then and see how much fun he’d 
get out of it!” 

However, this did not solve the problem 
of the immediate future. He had intended 
passing the winter here, where he had been 
so cozy all summer. It had been particularly 
handy, because he could emerge from his 
28 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


doorway in the shelter of the rocks, and take 
a good look about for enemies, before show- 
ing himself in the open. 

‘^A great time of year to have to move,’’ 
he complained as he peered this way and 
that through the aisles of trees in the effort 
to decide where to go. Every good location 
in these woods will be snapped up by this 
time, and I’ll just simply have to move into 
any hole I can find that no one else has any 
use for. I can’t stay here, that/s sure, or 
that Hound will be digging me out in no 
time.” 

The little chipmunk had a hallway 
ten times his own length there under ground, 
but he knew how Lop Ear could dig, and he 
knew he would never rest easy in the little 
cave at the end of the hallway, when he 
might find himself being dug out at any 
moment. 

^^One thing that was awfully foolish,” he 
grumbled on to himself, ^^was to dig only 
one entry-way. The next place I’ll make at 
least two, so that if he begins at my front 
door, I can slip out the back way. And that 
29 


THE TRAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


reminds me, I^d better get my excavating 
done in a burry, or tbe ground will freeze 
before I’ve half finished my winter quar- 
ters, and then whatever will become of me 

Shirr Chipmunk chattered angrily to him- 
self. 

Now that the Hired Man from the Valley 
Farm had found his hiding place, the hound 
would surely be set to digging him out. To 
move was absolutely necessary. 

And yet he had built so carefully, here 
under the boulder on the hill-top! He had 
stored enough supplies in his snug cellar to 
last him all winter. And besides he was get- 
ting dreadfully sleepy. Cold weather would 
soon be upon him, and he had little enough 
inclination for starting a new home. 

He started out none the less, to find a new 
site. Already the oak leaves were turning 
brown and falliug in a thick carpet through 
the forest aisles. The grass was yellow and 
soggy from recent rains, and the air damp 
and depressing. A pale sun shone at inter- 
vals, retiring after each half-hearted per- 
formance behind a sulky cloud. And the sky 
30 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONE 


hung gray save for a mere patch here and 
there. 

‘^A great time of year to be turned out of 
house and home/’ grumbled the little fellow. 

To the west of his hill lay an open meadow, 
and beyond that the Valley Farm. To the 
south lay the hill on which Frisky Fox had 
his home. To the east was nothing but 
swamp, clear down to Pollywog Pond. And 
that would never, never do for tunnel build- 
ing. 

To the north, beyond the Old Logging 
Road, stretched a wide brule where the for- 
est fire had swept the spring before. Now 
it was all young blueberry shrub. Oaks, 
chestnuts and beeches had been so crippled 
by the fiame, that it had taken all their 
strength to heal their wounds, hence there 
would be no nuts, and it was most essential 
to have a food supply close by. There was 
always danger in going too far from home, 
to say nothing of the labor involved in car- 
rying his stores from a distance. Where then 
should he go ? On beyond lay unknown dan- 
gers, and it was getting dusk. Shirr was 
31 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


tired and cold and hungry. Perhaps it would 
be best after all to take a chance in his old 
home. 

Thus it was that just as the setting sun 
was burning its way through the clouds for 
the last brief moment, Shirr dragged his 
weary little striped body back to his cave 
under the boulder. 

‘ ‘ Oh, Shirr ! look out ! ’ ^ suddenly screamed 
Jimmy Crow, who seemed to keep track of 
everything that went on in the woods. ‘‘The 
Hound is coming!” 

Shirr crept to the top of the boulder for 
a quick survey. There, sure enough, running 
along just ahead of the Hired Man, came 
Lop Ear, and what to do Shirr didn’t know. 
His little furry chest fairly quivered with 
the pounding of his heart, over which he 
clasped one paw as his round black eyes 
gazed at the horror that was bearing down 
on him. The nearest tree was just too far 
away. His mother had warned him against 
choosing such a location, but he had felt 
so sure of his own ability to keep a weather 
eye out! 


32 


THE TEAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


‘ ^ Shirr-r-r-r-r ! Shirr-r-r-r-r ! ” he squealed, 
passing the warning on to his neighbors. 
And ‘‘Shirr-r-r-r-r!’^ they all took up the 
cry, till every one of his neighbors was under 
cover. 

Until this moment the Hound had shown 
some doubt as to which way to go, but now 
he made straight for the little chipmunk. 

Shirr Chipmunk had brought trouble on 
his own young head. For until he had uttered 
his shrill cry the Hound had not known 
which of several trails he was supposed to 
follow. 

By way of making a bad matter worse, 
the little fellow now darted out of his bur- 
row in a wild thought of escape, then see- 
ing nowhere else to go, he flashed back into 
this burrow again. If only he had taken 
his mother’s advice, and dug a second entry- 
way. 

Now Shirr is rather a striking looking 
chap, with his red-brown coat, and the black 
and white stripes down his sides. And with 
all this darting in and out, the Hired Man 
33 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


finally saw him, and pointed him out to the 
Hound. 

Shirr’s teeth chattered with terror as he 
saw Lop Ear racing toward him. Then he 
quite lost his head, and instead of lying 
low and trusting to luck, he dashed franti- 
cally across the open meadow, and into the 
first hole he saw, a hole scarcely an inch 
wide, that seemed to lead down under a 
rock. 

This hole, as it happened, was the winter 
home of Writho, the Black Snake. And if 
it hadn’t been that the chill had sent Writho 
to sleep, it would have been all up with Shirr. 
As it was, Writho came to his senses just in 
time to feel the little chipmunk’s departing 
tail tickling his nose. With a hiss of wrath, 
he started in pursuit. But meeting Lop Ear 
before he had wriggled half way out, he 
backed in again hastily. 

Shirr, meantime, had made a flying leap, 
and was half way up the old apple tree and 
scolding for all he was worth. For Lop 
Ear could bay himself frantic, but he could 
never reach that high. 

34 


THE TRAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK ^ 


Just tlien a little pattering sound began 
rustling tbe few dead leaves that still clung 
to tbe naked branches. It was the first big 
drops of an approaching storm. In another 
moment it began to pour in sheets. The 
Hired Man suddenly remembered that he 
had left the hay barn open, and calling the 
Hound, he strode off home as fast as his hob- 
nailed boots would carry him. 

But Shirr only clung shivering to his tree 
trunk, till the heavy down-pour had 
drenched his furs and set his teeth to chat- 
tering in another manner. Assuredly, this 
was no way to spend the night. So, taking 
his courage in both paws, he whisked back to 
his boulder, there to await what the morrow 
might bring forth. i 

With the first streak of clearing weather. 
Shirr once more explored the blueberry burn 
with a view to a new building site. Racing 
on till he reached Lone Lake, he found a 
sunny slope covered with beech woods. And 
beech nuts, as everyone knows, are particu- 
larly handy for a chipmunk to carry. He 
can stow any number of the three-sided little 
35 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


things in his pockets, which reach in great 
folds of loose skin from his cheeks to his 
shoulders. 

But his troubles were not over, it seemed. 
For who should come trotting along that way 
in search of adventure but Frisk, the Red 
Fox Pup ! And no sooner did his keen black 
nose cross the trail of the little squirrel, than 
he started in pursuit. 

Shirr scampered for all he was worth, till 
he found a crevice between two stones. And 
into this he flattened himself. 

Life certainly had been thrilling for Shirr 
Chipmunk. 

First to be chased by the Hound, then to 
have the Fox Pup after him! But in his 
crevice in the rocks he was quite beyond 
reach of those sharp white teeth, and the Fox 
Pup soon got tired of waiting for him to 
come out. 

Shirr, impatient at the delay, heaved a 
sigh of relief when the sight of a brown 
bunny nibbling peacefully told him that the 
fox must be quite gone. 

Here in the beech woods he was going to 
36 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


have an even better home than before. For 
the forest floor was strewn with nlits. All he 
had to do was to make his tunnel, and there 
would be no further cause for worry. For 
with his huge cheek pockets he could carry 
his winter stores to his burrow in no time. 

First he would have to use those same 
pockets to cart out the dirt. The little fel- 
low set to work vigorously. Today there 
was a cheery bit of sunshine. Tomorrow it 
might rain. Ah I He had it I The very spot. 
On the edge of a tiny clearing grew a patch 
of juniper. With his tunnel entrance under- 
neath the bushes he could emerge and take 
a survey without the risk of being seen till 
he had satisfied himself no enemies were 
near. 

Besides, what fox would try to dig him 
out, when it meant getting his fine coat 
scratched by these sharp green needles that 
protected the berries ? 

Shirr began operations by digging a tiny 
hole with his handlike little paws, and carry- 
ing away the dirt thus removed in his cheek 
pockets. For he believed in hiding every 
37 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


sign of Ms whereabouts from those who 
might like him for supper. 

And just for fear he might leave the scent 
of his feet too strong and tell-tale around his 
doorway, he left each time in a different 
direction, and always with great flying leaps. 

Trying the entrance Anally with his head, 
which was as wide as any part of his body, 
he began to pack the dirt in hard and firm, 
waiting till he was at least his own length 
underground before widening his hallway. 
For in that narrow entry-way lay Ms de- 
fense. 

Pausing by and by a little distance away 
to comb the dirt from Ms whiskers and 
wash his face for luncheon, he was startled 
by the sudden silence in the woodland. 
Where but a moment before birds had been 
chirping overhead, now there was not a 
sound to betray their whereabouts. It meant 
trouble of some kind, but what? Shirr 
peered curiously this way and that. There, 
like a great black shadow directly above his 
head, hung Cooper Hawk, with eyes that 
glittered down at him, and talons spread for 
38 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TOlSnS: 


the snatch that would carry his prey into the 
air for a banquet. 

This time Shirr felt sure his end had 
come! For in that instant the great bird 
gave a piercing scream, then dropped in a 
swift spiral. His legs rather than his wits 
determined him to make one desperate effort 
to stay on the good green earth, and he was 
racing like a streak of lightning back to his 
hole. 

But no, he had attempted too much, for 
already he could feel the wind of those great 
four-foot wings. His striped sides quivered 
with the thought of the piercing death that 
must overtake him, and he had to open his 
mouth to draw a breath, and he uttered one 
agonized ‘‘Chirr-r-r-r-r!’’ 

With the hawk’s talons fairly tickling his 
fur. Shirr Chipmunk suddenly felt himself 
going down, down, down, as the ground be- 
neath his feet gave way. In fact, he fairly 
slid into an underground cavern. He was 
safe from Cooper Hawk, but whose home 
had he thus unceremoniously entered ? 

It might have been a skunk’s hole, for all 
89 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


he knew, and he would be no better off than 
he was before. But it meant one chance in 
a million, of escape, and Shirr took the 
chance. 

Sliding straight down for what seemed a 
great distance to the little squirrel, he came 
up suddenly with all four feet thrust into 
someone’s deep, warm fur! 

As it happened, he had landed in the bur- 
row of a sleepy old wood-chuck who was as 
cross as he was tired. And this invasion of 
his nap by such a frantic, quivering little 
person, with his sharp claws all out, awoke 
him in a temper. 

‘^What in the name of all that is annoy- 
ing are you doing here?” squeaked the old 
chuck furiously. ‘‘Get off my back this in- 
stant! It’s lucky for you I happen to be a 
vegetarian.” 

“Oh, please don’t drive me out!” begged 
Shirr. “Let me stay just two minutes more.” 

“Out with you, or I’ll help you out,” in- 
sisted the old chuck, emphasizing his re- 
marks with a nip on the flank. 

Sometimes in moments of peril, one’s 
40 



“ Shirr Chipmunk is attacked by Cooper Hawk ” 



THE TEAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


mind covers leagues of ground in a twin- 
kling. In the brief minute it took the old 
chuck to drive him forth from his haven, 
Shirr Chipmunk thought of several things. 

He thought of the huge hawk awaiting 
him outside, a monster with claws hanging 
ready to clutch the little fellow and tear him 
into bits as he flew back into the sky. And 
then he thought of the new home he was 
digging under the juniper bush, and the snug 
hole under the boulder whence the Hound 
had driven him forth. Was there no safety 
anywhere ? 

He really felt so sure that Cooper would 
be there to snatch him the instant he thrust 
his striped head above-ground that he could 
hardly believe his eyes when he saw the 
bird’s great, speckled breast and four foot 
wings soaring away after easier quarry. It 
seemed too good to be true ! 

But his nerves were shaken, and he felt 
the need of food and rest before he could 
work further on his tunnel. It occurred to 
him to slip back to the old home imder the 
boulder for the night. 

41 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


The autumn sun, which but a moment be- 
fore had been gleaming through a forest all 
reds and yellows, and the dark velvet of 
evergreens, now slipped behind a cloud, and 
dusk descended on the piny air. This made 
the going a trifle easier, and Shirr skipped 
along from tree to tree, around the blueberry 
burn, and down the Old Logging Eoad in no 
time. Carting across the familiar pasture in 
which his home had been, he slipped down 
the long hallway that led to his store-room, 
where for months he had worked harvesting 
acorns and ground-nuts and wild crabs. But 
what was that peculiar crunching sound? 
Someone was there before him, someone who 
was making free with his winter stores. 

‘‘How dare you ?’’ barked the tired adven- 
turer wrathfully. 

The fact that the intruder was Cousin 
Shadow Tail made little difference to Shirr 
Chipmunk. 

“Stealing my winter stores!” he chirped 
in exasperation, 

“Why, where is all the big noise coming 
42 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


from?’’ siirilled the Red Squirrel impu- 
dently. 

‘‘You great, big, thieving rascal, you!” 
barked Shirr, tail jerking angrily. “I de- 
clare, it is too bad of you 1 It isn’t as if you 
didn’t have a fine big store-room of your 
own, if you’d only take the trouble to fill it. 
Here I’ve toiled and slaved for months try- 
ing to get fixed for winter, and you come and 
help yourself the minute my back is turned. 
You get right out of here, or I’ll bite your 
nose!” And Shirr danced up to him with 
open jaws. 

“Dear me, what a lot of noise we can 
make,” laughed Shadow Tail. “Be careful 
or you’ll strain your voice. So you’ll bite 
me, will you ? Ha, ha ! Why, I could take 
two of you in one mouthful. But I wouldn’t 
like the taste. It would be too hot.” But 
he backed away just the same. “I hope you 
feel better by the time you’ve slept over it.” 

And that, indeed, was true. Shirr had 
forgotten the quarrel by the morning, and 
called the cheeriest kind of greeting as he 
sped back to bis beech wood. And my, how 
43 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK ' 


lie did work ! By noon lie had a tunnel sunk 
three feet below ground. With quite a nice 
cave rounded out at the bottom. Then a chill 
wind warned him that another storm was 
coming, and he left his last few loads of dirt 
just outside his doorway in a most tell-tale 
fashion. 

The next thing he knew, the light was sud- 
denly cut off, and his nose caught a strange 
breath sniffing down at him. Then he saw 
two great shining eyes! It was a weasel, 
with nose thrust squarely into the hole. 

Now he was a prisoner, and he had no 
supplies in his cellar yet. Why, he might 
starve! If only he had tunneled a second 
entryway! Then he might be able to slip 
out the back 'door while the foe waited at the 
front. Such a delay, too^ with winter com- 
ing on so fast and all this work to be done ! 

His main entrance was just the width of 
his head now, and the edges had been patted 
down so hard and firm that the next frost 
would make them as solid as iron. He could 
just squeeze his lithe body through. 

A little inside his tunnel broadened till he 
44 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


could turn around with comfort, and on be- 
yond was a storage room, that, when full, 
would last the sleepy winter through. Be- 
yond that was to be his nest, soft-lined with 
autumn leaves, and beyond that still, his 
rear hallway, his emergency exit, whose door 
would open away over, under another 
boulder. 

Then a new thought struck him. Why not 
go right on with his work while the enemy 
waited ? He had braved a variety of perils 
in the past two days, and he had survived 
every one. The only trouble was that now he 
could not carry the excavated dirt away ; he 
would have to pat it down into his tunnel 
walls. Well, that was better than sitting 
there worrying. And Shirr set to work with 
a vengeance. 

The weasel thrust at the narrow entrance 
with his pointed nose, his mouth watering 
for the tit-bit within. But to no avail. And 
by and by the sounds within ceased entirely. 
Could it be that Shirr had dug a second en- 
tryway and escaped? With a disgusted 
snarl the weasel slunk away, and began 
45 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


circling about to find SMrr’s back door. But 
there was none to be found, and at last he 
gave it up and went away. 

And Shirr? Why, the little chipmunk 
had simply given way to that drowsy feeling 
and taken a nap. 


46 


THE BIRDS’ CAFETERIA 


‘‘Hello, there!” cried Chickadee, a little 
gray fellow with a black cap, who sat on a 
twig of the wild apple tree. ‘ ‘ Tsic-adee, dee- 
dee-dee-dee 1 ” 

“Hello, yourself,” shouted Pecker, a 
downy black and white bird with a red patch 
on the nape of his neck. “I’m going to be 
your next door neighbor this winter.” 

“How jolly!” chirped the first comer, 
swinging head downward, like a circus per- 
former. The little hooks in his claws made 
it easy for him to cling to the under side of 
the limb. 

“Yes,” said Pecker, “it’s a bit too drafty 
down in my nest in the Old Apple Orchard. 
Besides, it’s too near Barnyard Tom. That 
cat will be the death of me yet ! . . . The way 
he prowls around all night ! My, but it does 
give one an uncanny feeling to wake sud- 
47 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


derdy and see Ms green eyes peering in one’s 
frontdoor!” 

‘‘My, I should tMnk so!” agreed CMck- 
adee. 

“So now I’m going to cMsel a new home 
in the south side of this beech, — and you may 
be sure I shall make it deep enough to escape 
the drafts.” And Pecker forthwith began 
such a tattoo on the aged bark that the cMps 
fairly flew. 

“I’m awfully glad we’re going to be neigh- 
bors,” said Chickadee, fluffing out his feath- 
ers to protect him against the chill of the 
November afternoon. “Because now Robin 
Red Breast and Betty Bluebird and so many 
of my friends have gone South, there will be 
just you and me and J unco of our own crowd 
left, to hold the fort. By the way, I guess 
I’m in one of your old houses now.” 

“Yes,” said Pecker, “but you’re more 
than welcome. I love to build, and each year 
I flatter myself I do a little better than the 
time before. When do you suppose Jimco 
will get here?” 


48 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


‘‘I rather expected Mm with that first 
little flurry of snow.’’ 

Well, it really looks as if we’d have snow 
before morning,” prophesied Pecker, be- 
tween pecks. ^‘And it’s coming from the 
North, so I expect Junco is fleeing before it 
this very minute. I shouldn’t be at all sur- 
prised if we’d eat breakfast with him yet. . . . 
And that reminds me, I simply must get this 
hole enlarged a little faster, or . . .” 

^^Shl” said Chickadee. Pecker turned. 
Down the Old Logging Road, with the sun 
setting red at their backs, came the Boy from 
the Valley Farm and his father. 

‘^He’s the same Boy that used to feed us 
in the Orchard last winter,” said Pecker. 
^H’m not afraid of him. Wonder what he’s 
carrying?” 

The Boy, dressed in a red plaid Mackinaw, 
had a long peeled pole across one shoulder, 
while the Parmer carried a box and a 
hatchet. 

Peering this way and that through the 
naked branches till they found an open 
$pace, the two now laid the pole on the 
49 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


ground and nailed the box to one end. Then 
they dug a hole with the blade of the ax and 
set the pole upright, the boy holding it in 
position while his father drove stakes all 
around to hold it firm. 

They next nailed a couple of sheets of tin 
(cut from old two-quart tomato cans), in the 
form of a sloping shelf around the pole, as 
high as they could reach. 

‘‘Wonder what that’s for?” chirped the 
little gray bird, but Pecker could not answer. 

The Boy and his father waited till a gust 
of wind came up, then nodded smilingly as 
the box veered around the top of the pole 
till the open side faced away from the wind. 
Then they went back the way they had come, 
only to reappear a little later with another 
pole which they carried still further into the 
woods. Chickadee watched, his black vel- 
vet cap just visible, as he clung head 
downward. When they were quite out of 
sight, he began exploring the queer box. 
There was a sloping roof that would shed 
the rain, and a floor that extended clear out 
on the open side like a porch. 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


much too big for a bird-house,” said 
Pecker, coming over to inspect. wonder 
why they Ve set it all by itself, so far from 
any tree. And what in the world do you 
suppose that tin shelf is for? It slopes down, 
so no one could possibly get a foot-hold. 
There is something mighty mysterious about 
this thing!” 

It was well for Pecker that he finished his 
hole that afternoon. For next morning they 
woke to a world of white. Not only was the 
ground covered, but the feathery swirl from 
the sky had loaded every branch and twig 
with frosting, and one could hardly see for 
the white mist that filled the air. 

‘‘Chip-churr, chip-churr! I say, there,” 
called a clear voice from the ground below. 

Chickadee poked his head forth and 
peered intently at what at first appeared to 
be a big brown leaf drifting about. It 
drifted to the top of a sapling, and Chick- 
adee flew down to have a look. 

‘^Why, iPs Junco, as I live !” he exclaimed. 
^‘How are you. Stranger?” 

Fine I” declared the plump newcomer. 

51 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


He was leaf brown on top. Underneath he 
had white feathers to match the snow, and 
white sides to his tail. His bill, too, was 
white. 

declare,’’ called Pecker, thrusting his 
head just out of his hole, ‘‘you always look 
so like the bark of a tree from above that I 
can scarcely tell you are there!” 

“Neither can Cooper Hawk,” laughed 
J unco. 

“Welcome to our winter colony!” 

“It’s a summer colony to me,” chirped 
Junco. “If you want to know what winter 
is, just migrate up to the Arctic Circle. . . . 
But there’s fine eating there all summer,” 
and he began hungrily boring into an oak 
gall for the little worm inside. “But tell 
me, what have you up there?” nodding to- 
ward the box on the pole. 

“Search me!” said Chickadee, setting to 
work to look for grubs on the under side of a 
limb, while Pecker began marching up and 
down the snowy tree-trunk with head 
cocked to hear the gnawing of insects under 
the bark. 


52 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


All day the white flakes fell feather-like. 
That night it turned still colder, and the 
snow froze into an icy crust. And when the 
sun rose again, every tiny branchlet gleamed 
like silver. 

^‘My, how cold my feet are!” shivered 
dhickadee, as he poked his little black head 
from his hole. 

‘‘Are you there. Pecker?” calling across 
to the beech tree. “I’m glad to see your red 
muffler. Didn’t know but that I might And 
you frozen stiff.” For the tiny black and 
white bird, with stiff tail braced against the 
trunk, was already trying to peck a hole 
through the ice. 

“Slim pickings it will be today,” he 
grumbled. ‘ ‘ Might as well freeze as starve. ’ ’ 

“That’s right,” agreed Junco gloomily. 

All forenoon they tried to peck through 
the ice to their food. And their little stom- 
achs began to feel dreadfully empty. “I 
wonder how long we could live without eat- 
ing,” Chickadee wondered faintly, as noon 
passed and there were still no signs of thaw. 

Then there was a crunching sound down 
53 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TOHK 


the Old Logging Road (Junco began pre- 
tending that he was just a brown leaf flecked 
with snow). It was the Boy from the Val- 
ley Farm again. This time he carried a 
long, slender stick, with just a tiny box on 
top of it. Coming to a stand-still directly 
underneath the pole house, he raised his stick 
till the end reached the platform of the little 
porch, then he emptied the box with a sud- 
den jerk of the stick and passed on. 

Chickadee peered after him bright eyed, 
then flew to see what it was all about. The 
next moment he set up a joyous call. ‘ ‘ Come 
here, fellows, tsic-a-dee, dee-dee-dee-dee!’’ 
he sang joyously, ^4t’s a regular feast!” 

Pecker and J unco lost no time in accepting 
the invitation, and all fell to hungrily. For 
there were chopped raw peanuts, cheap rais- 
ins and suet, and all sorts of table scraps, 
with even a little sunflower seed. ‘Ht’s a 
regular cafeteria, ’ ’ said Junco. ‘ ^ We ’ll each 
help ourselves to what we like best.” 

But the words were hardly out of his bill 
before a slim white form, for all the world 
like a snake, with its evil flat head, — except 
51 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


that it wore fur, — ^began to climb the adjoin- 
ing pine tree. ... It was Slim the Weasel, 
of all the wood folk the most dreaded. 
Chickadee, Pecker and Junco were so busy 
feasting that they did not even see him. 

Slim’s little red eyes gleamed hungrily, 
for he was fond of birds. But unfortunately 
for himself, the Boy had set the pole in a 
clearing, and the nearest branch was still 
too far away for him to venture a leap. 

Disgusted, he dropped to the ground, and 
started climbing the pole, only to come 
plump against the slanting shelf of tin. The 
shelf was just too wide for him to climb, and 
too high for him to leap. Again and again 
he tried, but to no avail, and he finally gave 
it up and went away. 

<‘Why, tliaVs what the little tin shelf is 
for,” marvelled Chickadee. ^‘That Boy’s 
our friend! Tsic-a-dee, tsic-a-dee, dee-dee- 
dee-dee-dee!” 

Now Chickadee was not the only winter’s 
refugee to whom the Boy was kind. 

To Mother Grouse Hen and her chicks, the 
55 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


long, hard winter had been one of suffering 
and peril. 

First had come the deep, dry, drifting 
snow, and the bitter cold and wind. That 
had not been so bad except for the difficulty 
of getting out for food. For the chicks, now 
well grown, and plump and sleek from the 
autumn’s berrying, had all snuggled down 
into a drift together (where the warmth of 
their breathing had hollowed out a cave for 
them). There the drift had hidden them 
alike from frost and fox and hawk. 

It was really quite comfortable there at 
first, in the heart of the drift, as they hud- 
dled together for mutual warmth. For the 
snow was full of oxygen, and they got all the 
air they needed. 

But after about three days of this, their 
hunger began to draw painfully at their 
empty crops. And they fared forth, braving 
the biting cold, on the chance of finding a 
few cedar and juniper berries. It had been 
scant pickings, I can tell you, with even the 
junipers buried in snow and a wind that 
made flying a gamble for feathered folk. 

56 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


They would lift their wings and make a 
brave start for a cedar tree, perhaps — and 
land, instead, on an oak, whose bare 
branches offered nothing they could eat. 

But all that had not been half as bad as the 
privations that had come when, with a thaw 
and a freeze, the crust had hardened into a 
glittering shell over every drift. 

Then, indeed, had their stanch hearts all 
but failed within them. Blinded, suffo- 
cated, they ploughed this way and that 
through their white prison. Finally, though, 
they pecked a way through the icy crust. It 
had taken their combined efforts, working 
on one part after another, before they had 
found a thin place where they could peck 
clear through. 

Once released, there had been the problem 
of finding food. For they were weak from 
fasting, one or two of the chicks being hardly 
able to lift their wings from sheer starva- 
tion. 

Even when they had found juniper berries 
up-thrust on their prickly branches above 
the snow, there had been a crust of ice to 
57 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


peck through, before even one frozen berry 
could be swallowed. Then one day some- 
thing happened. 

‘‘Crunch, crunch, crunch!’’ came some- 
one’s footsteps. 

Could it be J ake, the Hired Man with the 
black stick that spit fire and death. Mother 
Grouse Hen asked herself, as she and her 
little family beat the air to the heart of a 
spruce tree. 

From between the green-black foliage, 
drooping with thick snow, she watched with 
yellow eyes that blinked nervously. 

Down the Old Logging Road came a lad 
of fourteen or thereabouts, his great round 
cruiser snowshoes making footprints oddly 
out of proportion to his size. 

His red muffler made a bright spot in the 
landscape that could have been seen any- 
where against the surrounding whiteness. 
So also did his red checked Mackinaw blan- 
ket coat. His feet were encased in furry 
moose-hire larrigans that reached half way 
to his knees. And from his lips issued a 
cheery whistle that cut the stillness of the 
58 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


wood-land like a ray of light thrown sud- 
denly into the dark. 

What the boy did next will always be a 
matter of wonder to Mother Grouse Hen, — 
one of those things that seem too good to be 
true, — although he repeated the perform- 
ance often enough during the weeks that fol- 
lowed. (Indeed, without his interest in the 
tragic little lives of the feathered folk, there 
would have been many a tiny pile of fleshless 
feathers and frozen bones before returning 
spring brought relief and plenty to the forest 
folk.) 

Thrusting his mittened hand deep into his 
coat pocket, the Boy first scattered a handful 
of crumbs from his mother’s bread-box over 
the frozen snow. Then he climbed a spruce 
tree and tied a great, creamy strip of suet 
high in its swaying top. Finally, he fished 
into another pocket and strewed grain, the 
sweepings of the mangers, before the amazed 
little family, — and their joy was complete. 


59 


FEISKY, THE EED FOX PUP 


‘‘Children,’’ said Mrs. Red Squirrel, one 
day when the smell of wet earth, steaming in 
the April sunshine, mingled with the trill- 
ing of the robins in the Old Apple Orchard. 
“You will have to learn to climb now, there 
are no two ways about it ! 

“You are positively too heavy for me to 
lug around in my mouth any longer.” And 
she ordered them every one out of the nest. 

The truth of the matter was that she was 
worried about Father Red Fox, whose 
bright eyes had spied out her hiding-place 
that morning as he was returning home with 
a grouse hen for his family. 

If the children fell out of the tree, he 
would surely nab them. 

The two larger babies promptly followed 
along after their mother. But mouselike 
little Shadow Tail could only drive his claws 
60 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


into tlie bark and cling, while he stared in 
a daze at the surprising world that lay all 
about him. 

There was the pasture, over which he had 
been able to gaze from their hollow oak. Be- 
yond it lay the Valley Farm, with its barn 
and orchard, and the fresh-turned furrows 
of the cornfield. Mother Red Squirrel had 
chosen a site where she could watch all that 
came from ever and ever so far away. 

On the other side of the Old Stone Wall 
was the woods, a maze of brown trunks and 
green-black evergreens, with just a misty 
lacework where the branches were budding 
out. The pink flowers of the blueberry 
bushes that carpeted the ground beneath 
added one more color to the maze. ' 

‘‘This way! See how I balance with my 
tail!’’ his Mother urged him. But Shadow 
Tail only trembled, as he crept slowly after 
her. When, finally, he came to a little branch 
on which he could rest, he gave one look at 
the ground — so far below, — ^then crouched, 
afraid to move, his sharp little claws dug 
deep into the bark. 


61 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


A sudden puff of wind shook his branch 
till he thought surely he would fall. Then a 
leaf blew across his eyes, and everything 
whirled dizzily around him. 

^^Come!’’ commanded Mother Red Squir- 
rel. But Shadow Tail only blinked his beady 
eyes and scolded in his funny treble chirp. 
Finally she came back and licked his nose 
comfortingly with her warm tongue. But 
the little fellow just simply sat up on his 
hind legs and put his paws about her neck, 
till she had to take him in her mouth and 
carry him. 

^‘Easy game!” thought Frisky, the Red 
Fox Pup, watching from behind a boulder. 

The next day Shadow Tail was up with the 
sun ; and he felt much spunkier than he had 
the night before, as people always do when 
they rise with the sun. But then, of course, 
he didn’t know how Frisky Fox was watch- 
ing all his movements ! 

In fact, as he thought of the way he had 
made his mother carry him along the last 
smooth limb, he was really quite ashamed of 
his lack of courage. And again he disobeyed 
62 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


— wliicli is about tbe most dangerous thing 
a squirrel baby can possibly do. 

He could see an empty bird’s nest on the 
limb below, and he wanted to find out what 
it was like. 

Slipping softly out of the hole that made 
their doorway he sallied forth along the 
smooth limb that had seemed so impossible 
to climb the night before. 

Suddenly his fragile claws slipped over 
the smooth bark, he scrambled madly for a 
moment trying to keep his foothold, and 
down he went. 

Now there were a lot of things that Shadow 
Tail had never learned. One of these things 
was that squirrels do not fall to the ground, 
as nuts do when you drop them out of a 
tree. They just sail through the air like 
birds about to alight, for their broad tails 
buoy them up just enough to ease their 
descent. 

The squirrel baby was no exception. So 
gently did he drop from the smooth little 
branch he was on that he managed to thrust 
a claw into the branch just beneath, and 
63 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


there he hung for a moment trembling, his 
eyes shut, wondering if he were about to be 
dashed to pieces on the ground below. 

As he realized that nothing of the sort 
were likely to happen, he felt a rush of re- 
turning courage that just enabled him to 
draw himself up again — and there, right be- 
side him on the limb, was the bird’s nest he 
had set out to find. 

This nest, though a little wabbly, he found 
upon investigation to be just the right size 
for him to curl up in, with his plmny tail 
spread across his back to keep off the wind. 

Then, quite by accident, he overbalanced 
the old nest, and though he himself escaped 
by leaping back to the branch, the nest, in 
falling, hit someone down below full on the 
tip of his sensitive nose. 

It was Frisky, the Eed Fox Pup, who had 
been sitting there beneath a bush watching 
all that went on. He let out an angry yip. 

‘H’ll get you for that, you saucy thing, 
you!” he challenged in his high young voice. 

The Eed Fox family had been having 
64 



“I’ll get you for that,” said Frisky Fox 





0 


V 


i 


I 


\ 


I 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


troubles of its own, as Frisky’s Mother could 
have testified. 

If Father Red Fox had been there at the 
time, it would certainly have been his place 
to head off that impudent hound. Lop Ear, 
when he came so near to finding the five red 
puppies. 

But he was chasing grouse hens over on 
the other side of the ridge this morning, and 
there was no one to do it but the little 
mother. True, if anything happened to her, 
the pups would starve, because they had 
never learned to eat anything but milk. On 
the other hand, if Lop Ear got them, there 
wouldn’t be any puppies to feed. 

So, gnashing her teeth to keep her courage 
up, Mother Red Fox ran straight back into 
the ravine, barking to make the hound look 
around before he should come too near. 

Of course, all Lop Ear could think of now 
was how he would like to set his teeth in the 
insulting little creature who had dared 
to challenge him. So off he darted, yelping 
furiously, the little mother not twenty paces 
65 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


ahead, her red brush streaming straight out 
behind to help her keep her balance. 

But that did not last long. She was really 
much lighter on her feet than the spotted 
hound; and besides, she knew these woods 
like a book. So it wasn’t much more than a 
shake of a rabbit’s tail till she was clear out 
of sight. But he was following, because his 
keen nose told him everywhere her musky 
feet had been ; and if she ever wanted to get 
back to the babies waiting so hungrily on the 
hill-top, she would have to throw him off the 
scent. 

She had been racing alongside Rapid 
River, which she had crossed away up on the 
mountain-side where it was a shallow brook. 
But now they were in the bottom lands, 
where it had widened, and she hated to 
plunge in and swim, if there were any other 
way to get back on her own side of the water. 

Quick as a flash an idea came to her. Just 
around the bend she could hear the falls 
roaring and churning as they tumbled into a 
swirling pool. Taking particular care to 
leave her footprints plain in the soft clay of 
66 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


the river bank, where Lop Ear could not miss 
finding them, she picked out a log that didn’t 
look as if it could bear even her light weight 
unless she tiptoed across ever and ever so 
softly. Eight there she made her crossing, 
leaping the last six feet clean over the ugly 
pool that frothed and whirled in a hollow of 
the ledge. 

Sure enough — she watched it all from the 
top of a neighboring ridge — along came that 
clumsy hound, blimdering straight across the 
rotten log with his nose to the footprints she 
had left for him! And just as surely — 
Mother Eed Fox fairly laughed out of her 
little black eyes, to think how her ruse had 
worked — ^the minute he got back to mid- 
stream, the old log suddenly gave way be- 
neath him and he went sliding into the 
whirlpool. 

Around and around he whirled, just able 
to keep his nose above water by paddling his 
hardest, but quite helpless when it came to 
getting a foothold on the slippery sides of 
the basin. Lop Ear was certainly getting 
the worst of it! 


67 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


Mother Red Fox would have been glad 
enough if Lop Ear had drowned in the whirl- 
pool. Because just so long as he was at large, 
the five fox babies would never be quite safe 
from his jaws. 

But she didn’t really think he could 
drown, because he swam so well. And even 
if he didn’t get out right away, he would 
slide over the edge of the basin after a time 
and come off with no more than a drench- 
ing. 

Still, she watched from behind a bush on 
the ridge, till she saw that that was just 
what did happen. At least, he was ready to 
call it a day, and slink away home without 
giving her any more trouble. 

Meantime she must get back to the red- 
brown pups as fast as ever she could. And 
that was pretty fast, you may believe, when 
she began to wonder if anything had hap- 
pened to them during her absence. What if 
Slim the Weasel had got a sneaking feeling 
that there might be something good to eat 
on her hilltop ? 

So, taking as roundabout a way as she 
68 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


could, just in case Lop Ear had not had his 
ardor altogether cooled, she let no grass grow 
under her feet until she had once more tip- 
toed down to the old den under the hilltop, 
where five hungry voices rended her moth- 
er’s heart. 

With a quick lick on each of the inquiring 
little noses, she stretched out beside them 
for a moment’s rest. But there wasn’t go- 
ing to be any peace in the Red Fox family 
until it had found a new den. There was a 
nice one, she remembered, over on the oppo- 
site ridge, that she and Father Red Fox had 
come near deciding on last fall when they 
had first set up housekeeping. True, it was 
rather drafty, but now winter was over that 
would be no drawback. The thing that 
counted was that it was safe. No hound, to 
her knowledge, had ever come within baying 
distance of it, and no one, to look at the 
narrow crack through which one entered, 
would dream that it led straight to a fox 
family’s home. 

This new den, as she remembered it, was 
about three feet under ground, and through 
69 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


it led a tunnel with two openings. One open- 
ing, far back on the hilltop, had a pile of dirt 
heaped up about it, but this was not the 
real door. 

It was just their make-believe door. It 
was all banked up on the inside so that no 
one, like Slim the Weasel, could possibly get 
in that way. The real door was just that 
crack in the rocks, where the ferns would 
soon grow high about it. 

Taking the biggest of the clumsy young- 
sters by the scruff of the neck, she, there- 
fore, slung him back across one shoulder just 
as she would a hen, and trotted off to the 
new home, where she left him away back 
in the darkest corner with the stern com- 
mand to lie stni as he valued his safety. 

By the time she got back to the waiting 
four, she found Father Red Fox anxiously 
counting noses. Having crossed the trail of 
the hound, he needed no argument to be per- 
suaded of the value of the change, and he, 
too, seized a pup, and even led the way with 
all the air of being the one who had really de- 
cided the matter. One more trip and the 
70 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


little family was comfortably settled on Lone 
Ridge. (At least, things were comfortably 
settled so far as the Red Fox family was 
concerned.) 

There was some one in a neighboring tree, 
however, who held a different view of the 
matter, and that was Mother Red Squirrel. 

When Mother Red Fox brought in a trout 
from Rapid River, or a frog from Pollywog 
Pond, the young foxes always sat around the 
prisoner in a fat row, their ears cocked as if 
they knew all about it and their pudgy paws 
making sleights at the creature as it flopped 
about on the rocks before the den. 

But beyond a young field mouse that 
hardly made a mouthful for a pup like him. 
Frisky Fox had thus far never brought in 
anything larger than a beetle for himself. 
Not that he had ever wanted more than the 
sport of chasing something — ^thanks to the 
ample diet provided by Mother Red Fox, 
who had begun to supplant his milk with 
food more suited to his new little needle-like 
white teeth. 

But from the moment Shadow Tail had 

71 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


knocked the old nest off of the limb and it 
had struck Frisky, it became the one great 
longing of his foxy heart to catch that saucy 
squirrel. He therefore kept a close watch 
on all that went on in the Eed Squirrel fam- 
ily from that day forward. 

He could see the youngsters playing tag 
every day, so confident had even Shadow 
Tail become as he gained skill in climbing, 
and Frisky used to sit on the very top boul- 
der of the ledge that marked his den and 
watch them chasing-beetles playing hide and 
seek. 

Shadow Tail he thought rather set on his 
own way ; and Frisky had learned from his 
own mother how dangerous it is to disobey. 
He was, therefore, not surprised when one 
day the squirrel baby did something that was 
very wrong. 

Shadow Tail, having coaxed in vain to be 
taken down to the ground, where he could 
see a handsome red mushroom growing quite 
close to their tree trunk, waited till his 
mother was busy stripping off a bit of bark 
underneath which she could hear a fat grub 
72 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


boring. Then, quick as a wink, and with 
never a look about him for possible danger, 
he scurried down to the ground, and across 
to that red mushroom. 

He was just nibbling a bit off the side and 
spitting it out again because it tasted pep- 
pery, when he thought he heard a rustle 
behind him. 

He cocked his head to listen, but the sound 
had ceased, and he began nibbling again. 
But just behind a little clump of bushes, a 
red-brown form the size of a two months’ 
puppy was creeping forward inch by inch, as 
stealthily as a cat stalks a bird. 

A second time there came a sound, no more 
than the crackling of a leaf stem. This 
time it made the fur along his spine begin to 
rise. Something must be wrong — ^but what ? 


73 


THE TRIALS OF SHADOW TAIL 


Decidedly there was something wrong, 
else Shadow Tail, the disobedient squirrel 
baby, would never have had that prickly 
feeling along his spine. 

For, crouching catlike behind a bush, 
young Frisky Fox was gayly making ready 
for a spring. 

He’d show Mother Red Fox that he could 
catch something larger than a shrew mouse I 

Had the wind not been blowing the other 
way, Shadow Tail would have known there 
was trouble brewing in the rear — though 
squirrels don’t place half the dependence on 
their noses that they do on their ^‘toeses.” 

But the wind was not in the right direc- 
tion — as Frisky Fox well knew, when he 
chose to approach from that angle — and 
Shadow Tail was just beginning to tell him- 
self there was nothing in it, when — ^with a 
74 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A>TONK 


rush and a spring — ^young Frisky made a 
leap! 

At the same instant Mother Red Squirrel, 
far up in the tree above, gave a shriek of 
warning, and her cry so startled the squirrel 
baby that he jumped at least three feet 

‘‘Climb — climb for your life!’’ cried 
Mother Red Squirrel, barking her way down 
to him in great bounds, and altogether mak- 
ing such a racket that young Frisky Fox 
stopped short to see what it was all about. 

“Climb!” shivered Mother Red Squirrel. 
Her teeth chattered with fright and her tail 
jerked up and down in her excitement as she 
dropped to the ground and whisked across 
to the neighboring pine so close to the pup 
that he all but got a mouthful of her tail ! 

My! How he scrambled up that tree 
trunk ! He never stopped till he was higher 
than Frisky Fox could jump if he tried all 
day. 

“I’ll get you yet,” barked the disap- 
pointed little fox, hopping up and down in 
the vain hope of getting just a nip at him. 

“You wiU not!” chirped Mother Red 
75 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


Squirrel’s young hopeful, now that he was 
safe. ^‘Not till you learn to be more spry 
than that!” 

But his heart still beat hard in his furry 
little chest, and in his secret soul he was not 
so sure about it after all. 

Now this was not Shadow Tail’s first ad- 
venture. He had not had to wait for the 
Fox family to move into the den beneath the 
oak tree. It had happened in this way : 

Away down below, at the Valley Farm, at 
the end of the wood road, there was a Little 
Girl. No one of the Forest Folk minded the 
Little Girl, she moved so softly — though 
they used to view her red hair ribbon with a 
good deal of interest, peering at her, bright- 
eyed, from all sorts of hiding places that she 
never even guessed. 

Something called her to the woods this 
particular afternoon. The warm April sun- 
shine and the sounds of birds and squirrels 
combined to make her feel exactly as if she 
would like to fling her strap of school books 
clear to the woodshed roof. But, being a 
girl, she didn’t. 


76 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


Instead, she laid it on the kitchen table, 
took one peek into the empty cooky jar, then 
went racing down the lane and across the 
corn field, leaping in glad bounds from fur- 
row to furrow, till she reached the edge of 
the woods. 

She hadn’t seen the least sign of violets 
yet, though there were round checkerberry 
leaves that came near fooling her. So she 
wandered on, till she spied the old oak with 
its low-hanging branches which were so easy 
to climb. 

The minute her feet began scraping along 
the bark there was great excitement in the 
nest in the hole in the trunk. As it hap- 
pened, Mother Red Squirrel was away, leav- 
ing the babies quite alone. And Father Red 
Squirrel, like all squirrel fathers, had gone 
off to the club as soon as the babies came. 

Of course. Mother Red Squirrel never 
would have left them, even to get her dinner, 
had she not first made them promise faith- 
fully not to move or squeak till she got back. 
If only they had all obeyed her, things would 
have gone all right. But no sooner had the 
77 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


Little Girl found a seat on a limb than she 
heard a tiny squeaking right beside her ear ! 

Peering cautiously into the opening, she 
thrust in her hand until it encountered some- 
thing warm and furry. 

Shadow Tail’s little heart began thumping 
up and down, up and down so hard that it 
seemed as if it must burst with fright in 
just another minute. 

Too late Shadow Tail realized that his 
mother had been right. 

For, if he hadn’t squeaked, the Little Girl 
never would have known he was there. Of 
course, he could not imagine what it could 
be that would make so much noise climbing 
into the old oak. But then woods babies 
don’t have to know what it is all about. All 
they have to do is to mind their mothers, and 
they will generally come out all right. 

Of course, too, the Little Girl never would 
have heard such a wee, high-pitched squeak- 
ing if she hadn’t been sitting so very still, 
with her head right beside the hole, because 
human beings don’t have nearly such sharp 
ears as the wood folk. 

78 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


As it was, all she had to do to find him 
out was to twist her head around facing the 
hole, and she could peer straight into its 
dusky depths. 

When her cautious hand had found some- 
thing warm and furry, she closed her fingers 
around the topmost of the wriggling bodies, 
and drew it forth, and there in the palm of 
her hand lay Shadow Tail. 

A tiny mouse-like creature she found him, 
with a long, willowy tail that just promised 
the plumy breadth of his mother’s. 

And because she was so happy at finding 
the cunning fellow, she never once thought 
how his poor heart was thumping, up and 
down, and up and down, till he could hardly 
draw his breath. She was not a cruel girl, — 
she had nothing but the kindest feeling for 
Shadow Tail, — ^but that was something he 
had no way of knowing. He expected to be 
eaten alive in just another minute. 

Again, she never thought how worried 
Mother Red Squirrel would be if she took 
him home with her. All she could think of 
was how perfectly jolly it would be to have 
79 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


him for a pet. So cuddling him warmly 
into her two hands, she raced back to the 
farm with him as fast as ever her short legs 
could carry her. 

Arrived at the big farm kitchen, which 
was still deserted save for Fluff, the Maltese 
kitten, who had slipped in with her when she 
opened the door, she laid Shadow Tail on 
the clean-scrubbed kitchen table, where his 
weak young legs sprawled to all four points 
of the compass. 

She now set some milk before him in a 
tiny dish. But, of course, the squirrel baby 
had no more idea of what that was for than 
an unweaned kitten. When she gently tried 
to make him taste it, he felt sure it was some- 
thing very, very dangerous, and he backed 
away from it till he nearly backed off the 
edge of the table. 

Feeling that he must be taught to eat or he 
would starve, the Girl brought him back to 
the milk dish. But by now he was so fright- 
ened that he resisted till he overturned the 
dish and drenched himself with milk. 

80 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


He was certainly not enjoying his visit as 
much as the Girl had hoped ! 

To cap the climax, Fluff, who had been 
watching everything from the window-sill, 
suddenly began tip-toeing across the table. 

No, Shadow Tail was not enjoying his 
visit ! 

And now Fluff must come sneaking up to 
pounce on him! He was so wet from his 
unexpected milk bath that his tail no longer 
fluffed, — it hung limp and spiritless, with the 
wet fur clinging; and what with being so 
tiny and so mouselike anyway, it is no won- 
der that Fluff considered it her duty to catch 
him. 

The squirrel baby was not so young but 
that he knew the look in her yellow eyes! 
He felt the end had really come ! 

The next instant the Little Girl took him 
in her hand to wipe his fur dry. Quick as a 
flash he saw a way out of his difficulties. 
For there before him a long dark tunnel 
stretched away to no telling where! As an 
actual fact, the tunnel was the brown sleeve 
of the Little GirPs frock. But Shadow Tail, 
81 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


gaining courage with the hope of escape, 
went scrambling straight up inside. 

At this the Little Girl gave a shriek, for 
his tiny claws scratched her arm, and she 
didn’t know but that he might bite. So she 
wriggled and squirmed about till she had 
reached up and coaxed him to let go. 

As she once more held him in her hand she 
suddenly noticed how his heart was beating, 
and she realized how very, very unhappy he 
must be. And because she was really a kind- 
hearted Little Girl, she decided to take him 
back to his mother at once. 

First arming herself with a peace offering 
of goodies from the pantry, she raced back 
with him as fast as ever she had come. And 
it was not till she had gently laid him in the 
nest in the hollow oak that she stopped hav- 
ing that sorry feeling inside. 

Meantime, where was Mother Red Squir- 
rel? She had been having a bad time of it 
herself, you may be sure, or she never would 
have left the nest so long unguarded. 

As it happened, no sooner had Father Red 
Fox dropped the last fat pup into the new 
^ 82 


THE TRAVELS OE HONK-A-TONK 


den than he started out to see what tit-hit 
he could find for supper. The very first tit- 
bit he spied was Mother Red Squirrel, who 
had just climbed into a pine tree, with a view 
to investigating the crow’s nest that swayed 
in its top. A crow ’s egg wouldn ’t be bad eat- 
ing after having had her hands so full with 
the three babies! But no sooner had she 
started up the trunk than she saw Father 
Red Fox sitting beneath, just waiting for 
her to come down! 

Not that Mother Red Squirrel was going 
to allow herself to be treed by a fox! No, 
indeed! 

But the unfortunate part of it was that 
she had chosen a tree that stood by itself in 
the woods, so that it didn’t look possible to 
reach a branch of any neighboring tree by 
even the longest leap. 

Needless to say she had given up all 
thought of the crow’s egg, for this time at 
least, because any attempt on her part to 
climb to the great scraggly nest in the top of 
the pine would have brought about her ears 
a storm of protest, had the crows caught her 
83 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


in the act, and she would just simply have 
had to race back to the ground to escape 
their beaks, no matter how many foxes were 
waiting there. 

Now, the nearest tree, a maple sapling, 
was still so far away that it would be taking 
a desperate chance to try to leap to its 
branches. 

The tantalizing part of it was that, once 
in the maple, it would be an easy matter to 
go all the rest of the way home by mnning 
from branch to branch through the woods, 
because all the trees between the maple and 
home were so close together that their 
branches fairly interlaced. 

She started to bark to keep her courage 
up, seizing this opportunity to hurl all the 
hard words she could think of at the old fox, 
licking his chops down below. 

And so great was her excitement that she 
quivered from her nose to her tail, the ve- 
hemence of her bark lifting her clear off her 
feet, just as a dog’s bark so often lifts him 
into the air, muzzle first. 

Of course there was no one in all the woods 
84 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


so skillful as the squirrel family at making 
flying leaps, their broad tails helping them 
to parachute from one branch to another. 
But in this case she could never make it, she 
felt sure. It was just a question of which 
was better for the mother of a family of 
helpless babes, to try the leap and fail or to 
stay there while her babies starved. 

She took her stand on the topmost branch 
of her pine tree on the side towards the sap- 
ling, hoping against hope that something 
wholly unexpected would happen. Perhaps 
some creature larger than the fox would 
come and scare him off ! Perhaps he would 
see easier game somewhere else ! 

Finally the unexpected did happen. A 
little breeze sprang up ! It wasn’t much of a 
breeze at first, but after a few minutes it was 
swaying the maple sapling right straight 
towards her tree. Seizing the very instant 
when the two branches came the closest, she 
made her leap, and landed, clinging safely, 
to the smaller tree. 

Now when Mother had reached the nest in 
the hollow oak, she nosed eagerly over her 
85 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


sleeping babies to see if all was as it should 
be. But when she came to Shadow Tail, all 
sticky from the milk he had fallen into, and 
all over his fur the terrif3dng hmnan scent 
of the Little Girl’s hands, she quickly had 
the story of his adventure in the farm 
kitchen. 

So she gave him a bath, holding him in her 
two arms, for all the world like a human 
mother, licking his fuzzy orange fur till it 
shone, and combing his tail with her claws. 


86 


A SQUIREEL’S PARADISE 


Summer passed, and Shadow Tail began 
thriftily filling his cellar for winter. (That 
is, thriftily for a Red Squirrel youngster. — 
He was not half so industrious as his cousin, 
Shirr Chipmunk.) 

Then one day the Hired Man foimd his 
stores, nuts it had taken him all the autumn 
to gather — and began climbing to their hid- 
ing place with a bag to carry them away in. 
Shadow Tail was desperate. Without a mo- 
ment’s hesitation, he made a dash for the 
opening that served him for a doorway. 
Once inside, he took up his position a good 
distance below on his little hoard of nuts. 
And there he waited ! 

The Hired Man reached a foothold from 
which he could thrust his arm into the hole. 
Down he thrust his greedy hand till just the 
87 


THE TEAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


tips of his fingers touched the little fellow ^s 
stores. 

The next instant a darting pain ran 
through the Man’s forefinger. Shadow 
Tail’s long front teeth met through the flesh 
with a click, and his jaws clamped, for he 
did not mean to let go. 

The Hired Man gave a yell, and tried to 
withdraw his hand, but the little squirrel 
clung furiously and, bracing all four legs 
against the rim of his hole, refused to let the 
hand be withdrawn. 

The thief said things that Shadow Tail 
could not understand, though the tone was 
menacing. 

But with the memory of all the long days 
he had toiled Shadow Tail had no intention 
of showing mercy to a creature so many, 
many times larger than himself. ^‘So, you 
would rob us and leave us to starve?” 
gurgled the little squirrel through set teeth. 

Then the Hired Man jerked his hand 
through the opening, despite all his tiny op- 
ponent could do. But Shadow Tail still 
hung on, his jaws set fiercely, and the claws 
88 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


of his agile hind feet scratching at the 
Hired Man^s wrist. 

Suddenly the little fellow received a sting- 
ing blow on his head. Then all was dark- 
ness. What happened next he did not know. 
It was Jim Crow who followed overhead as 
the Hired Man went running back to the 
Valley Farm, the squirrel still clinging with 
jaws clamped to the swelling finger, though 
his eyes were closed in a faint. 

Then the Boy met them, and pried the 
little fighter’s jaws apart, and bathed the 
Hired Man’s injured hand, while Shadow 
Tail lay limp at their feet. 

‘‘Wake up, wake up. Shadow Tail! The 
Hired Man will kill you, sure, now,” Jimmy 
cawed helplessly from a tree-top overhead. 
But the little fighter never moved. 

Had Shadow Tail’s fate depended on the 
Hired Man alone there would certainly be 
one less squirrel to gather nuts in the North 
Woods. 

For his attack on the hand that would 
have robbed him he would assuredly have 
been thrown to the cat as he lay there, 
89 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


stunned and dizzy, at their feet. But the 
Boy from the Valley Farm had come in the 
nick of time. 

He now picked up the little fellow and 
stroked him softly, cuddling him into the 
warm pocket of his coat and starting back 
to the house with him. 

When Shadow Tail opened his eyes he 
stared about him dizzily. For surely he had 
never seen such a wonderful place as this 
human storehouse the Boy called an attic. 
Though he was still frightened, because the 
Boy was watching, and one never trusted 
these human creatures, he saw at a glance it 
was a squirrel’s paradise. 

Ranged along one wall were barrels and 
barrels of nuts — ^hazel nuts that one could 
carry away in one’s cheek! And there were 
more chestnuts than he could eat in a winter, 
as well as harder shelled kinds. 

Nor was this all. There were apples along 
another wall — ^barrels and barrels of blush- 
ing Baldwins, perfumed Pound Sweets and 
juicy Greenings — and there were other 
kinds, much more fragrant smelling than 
90 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


the puckery wild apples he knew. His 
mouth watered, and he watched the boy out 
of the corners of his beady eyes to see if he 
were going to be left alone. 

Nor were nuts and apples all that filled 
his heart with wonder. Here were great 
strings of seed corn hanging to dry from the 
rafters. And there were dried bean vines, 
and ripening tomatoes hanging by their 
roots. 

How he longed for the Boy to go and leave 
him to sample them. Now, the Boy would 
not have cared if he had. In fact, he had 
brought Shadow Tail to this very spot, hop- 
ing to give him a treat. But how could the 
little squirrel know that ? Had not one hu- 
man creature robbed and all but killed him ? 

Perhaps the Boy guessed the way he felt 
about it, because presently he climbed back 
down the ladder and pulled the trap-door 
shut. Shadow Tail was left alone. 

He blinked for a moment in a long ray of 
sunshine that crept through the dusty win- 
dow and along the floor. Then he gathered 
courage and scuttled to the nearest barrel. 

91 


THE TRAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


My, how he feasted! He paused in fright 
every time the wind whistled or the old floor 
creaked. But wasn ’t he happy ! 

When he had eaten till his eyes stuck out, 
he set to work to harvest some of the good 
things. There was a crevice imderneath the 
window-sill. And one never knew when the 
hour of need might come. 

But eating did not make up all of a squir- 
rel’s life. There are things he loves even 
better than food. He is not happy without 
his freedom to roam the woods with his kind. 
And Shadow Tail quickly realized that he 
could never be happy as a prisoner even 
here. 

No, a squirrel could not be happy in even 
such a paradise. He wanted his freedom, 
even if it meant cold and hunger. He 
scrambled to the dusty window-sill, shining 
in the last rays of the setting sun, and 
pressed his nose to the pane that shut him in. 
And his eyes were wistful as he gazed toward 
the woods beyond. It would have melted the 
Boy’s heart had he seen. 

Indeed, he had never intended to keep 
92 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


Shadow Tail a prisoner. But of course the 
squirrel could not know that, as his experi- 
ence with the Hired Man had robbed him 
of his faith in human kind. He was angry 
still as he thought how that great creature, 
so many times his size, would have robbed 
his winter’s store. And the thought made 
him more eager to get back to his home in 
the hollow oak. So Shadow Tail set his 
bright eyes to work to see if there were not at 
least a knothole through which he might 
escape. 

By and by the Boy came up again, but 
Shadow Tail only scuttled down into a bar- 
rel of hazel nuts till all but his face was 
buried, and there watched, bright-eyed, 
while the Boy coaxed. 

‘‘Come here, and I’ll take you back to the 
woods,” the Boy urged. But the squirrel 
did not understand, and though this time 
the Boy left the hatch to the ladder open. 
Shadow Tail had not the slightest intention 
of venturing out that way. For below lay 
unknown regions — and besides his sharp 
93 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


ears had heard the sound of the hound’s bark 
and the cat’s hungry mew. 

Neither could his bright eyes discover the 
slightest opening in the attic walls. 

A third time the Boy visited the attic. 
This time he must have understood, for he 
found the little squirrel with nose pressed 
flat against the glass. 

‘‘Well, then, if that’s the way you want to 
go, you shall,” laughed the Boy. “Aren’t 
you even going to say good-by?” But 
Shadow Tail had waited for no second invi- 
tation. He had leaped to an old apple tree 
below, and was scrambling down its trunk, 
and across the barnyard, before the Boy 
could even get his head out the window to 
look. 


94 


KREK THE PHEASANT COCK 
1. The Orphan 

It was one of those breezy days in June 
when the sun peeps through creamy billows 
of wind cloud that proved his day of fate. 

Other young birds were learning to fly, and 
the flelds were fragrant with pink sweet 
clover. The upper meadow was dotted white 
with daisies, and violet and yellow with vetch 
and buttercups. Plovers called musically, 
and a flock of blackbirds whirled and cur- 
veted like drilling troops till they found a 
treetrop to their liking. Trim-tailed barn 
swallows darted back and forth in search of 
food for their young. 

In the orchard beyond the Valley Farm 
the Hired Man was plowing. The wood 
stretched green and shadowy from Mt. 
Olaf, while to the West the hills rose blue 
in the distance above the checkered farm- 
lands. The meadow grass, knee high, was 
95 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


peopled with a myriad of crickets, and 
bumble bees droned over the clover. 

It was a day for feeling the joy of just 
being alive. 

The Boy from the Valley Farm was cross- 
ing the Upper Pasture when he stopped to 
pick wild strawberries. Now it happened 
that Madame Pheasant had also been visit- 
ing the wild strawberry patch, — she and the 
one surviving chick of the little brood of 
twelve she had so proudly hatched the month 
before. 

For in the little rocky glen that cut the 
pasture just beyond the strawberry bed 
there lived a cat-like black and white striped 
fellow, malodorous of reputation and very 
fond of chicken. 

Here, in the fastness of the stone pit, — 
roofed over as it was with saplings and pro- 
tected by a barbed wire entanglement of 
blackberry vines, he could dart out on any 
chick that strayed too near, and even 
Madame Pheasant be scarce the vnser for it. 

To her, home was a patch of staghorn 
sumac. For, once her chicks were tucked 
96 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


away beneath the vines of her own little 
rock-pit, it would be a warier hunter than 
the skunk, — and one less fond of keeping 
his fur intact, — ^who would venture a race 
for them there. 

Little did the Boy imagine how near were 
the two pairs of bright, beady eyes that 
watched him gobbling up their berries, till 
with a sudden backward move, he all but sat 
on both hen and chick. 

Madame Pheasant, with a startled cry, 
flew straight for the blackberry vines, while 
the lone chick half ran through the grass to 
the sumac patch. The Boy thus found him- 
self between mother and chick. The hen 
fluttered and squawked in her effort to dis- 
tract his attention, but only succeeded in 
waking the skunk. She was never seen from 
that hour. 

Grabbing his big straw hat like a butter- 
fly net, the Boy leapt after the chick. An 
instant more and he held cupped between his 
two hands a little cock pheasant scarce as 
broad as his palm, and as handsome in his 
97 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


neat brown and white wings as anything 
you can imagine. 

^‘Krek — Krek!’’ remarked the orphan 
hoarsely, and struggled free. And the Boy 
let him go. 

Then came long, free days in the tall 
meadow grass, when Krek wandered be- 
neath sunny skies, catching here a grass- 
hopper and there a doodle-bug, or staying 
his thirst with berries. Even the thunder 
showers he loved. 

With eyes on the cool green depths of the 
woods that stretched to meet the pasture, he 
used to try his wings, uttering a creaky call 
just as he so often heard those long-tailed 
fellows, the grown cock pheasants, uttering 
theirs, as they rose with a rush of wings from 
their coverts. 

2. Bunhies 

Then came a man with a mowing machine, 
who drove him from one stronghold to an- 
other. 

The summer passed. The abundant food 
had made him into a fine, well-grown young 
fellow. The woods had become a glory of 
98 


THE TEAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


scarlet and old gold and purpling grapes, 
and a sumac thicket blazing with the crim- 
son torches of its ripening seed pods ! 

Por awhile Krek feasted on the grape-vine 
that clambered over the sumacs and the 
stillness of the hazy afternoons wrapped him 
about with a great peace. Every here and 
there a sound like his own harsh ‘^kre-e-ek’’ 
would grate forth with the sudden whirr of 
wings that marked another stalker of the 
forest aisles taking to flight. There was one 
young fellow in particular who came to feed 
at the grape-vine, who interested him, — a 
young cock slightly smaller than himself, 
but with the most amazing knowledge of the 
woods, — doubtless due to his mother’s train- 
ing. Krek followed when he left for an open 
patch where there were bugs and butterflies 
to put a flnish to their feast. 

Krek’s comrade was an orphan too, now, 
but he noticed that most of the young 
pheasants still ran with their mothers, 
though the fathers held to the bachelor ways 
that obtained for all save during a brief 
period each year. 


99 


THE TEAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


As the red and gold gave place to dead 
brown leaves that drifted in clouds over the 
forest floor, and the sunshine cooled before 
it left the graying sky, Krek and his bunky 
found that they could sleep more comfort- 
ably o’ nights by huddling flve or six young 
cocks together in some sheltered hollow. 

The young hens also bunked together now, 
while the older hens sought shelter two by 
two, and the older cocks nested in pairs in 
the crevices of the rocks where the leaves 
drifted comfortably into the cracks. 

Krek had his favorite shelters here and 
there in the woods, the best being the hollow 
that had been burned out of the base of a 
tree. Here the warmth of their bodies was 
penned in, while the hill cut off the winds 
that came down from the North. Sometimes 
the snow drifted clear over their heads in 
the night, but the warmth of their breathing 
melted a little air space so that they did not 
suffocate. 

It was thus easier to keep warm when the 
snow was deep, though harder to find food. 
But there were always skunk cabbages down 
100 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


in the swamps, — ^unfragrant, it is true, but 
filled with delicious little seed balls, cottony 
inside and shaped like toy pineapples. 
These were filled with half a dozen to a dozen 
seeds or nuts as brown and good as so many 
tiny hazel nuts. 

As the spring sunshine melted the last 
white patches in the soggy glens, and the 
pink-white Mayflowers thrust fragrantly 
through the brown of the fallen leaves, a 
strange exhilaration filled him, and Krek 
noticed that the older cocks would get on a 
stump and boastingly call ‘‘ka-ka-ka-ku-ka,” 
keeping up this performance all day long, 
instead of hunting for food. First one 
would flap his wings and call, then he would 
peer all about, and perhaps make a circuit 
of the nearby underbrush, then fly to the 
stiunp again and utter his challenge. And 
Krek wondered much. 

A few weeks later, wandering over the 
south side of a hilltop that overlooked the 
brook, he came plump upon a gray-brown 
form that sat movelessly beneath a seedling 
pine, where she could keep a weather eye on 
101 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


all that passed below her. Krek went on 
down to the brook to drink. When pres- 
ently he retraced his steps to the open ridge 
where the grasshoppers were most plentiful, 
he passed the spot where she had sat, and to 
his amazement found in the hollow of the 
leaves twelve tiny grayish olive eggs. None 
but a pheasant’s eyes would have seen them 
at all, so perfectly did they blend with the 
green shadow that overhung them, — ^just as 
none but a bird’s sharp eyes could have seen 
the gray-brown hen as she sat there as still 
as a little mound of leaves. 

3. The Call of Spring 

But Krek did not at this time connect the 
calling of the cock pheasant on the stump 
with the pretty home beneath the seedling 
pines. Nor did he, later, think of the olive 
tinted eggs when he came upon the mites of 
down that followed the hen, scratching for 
little bugs the way she scratched for big 
ones, or raising their weenty wings in little 
darts at passing butterflies, cheeping their 
soft ‘‘t’seep, t’seep, t’seep.” 

102 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


No, Krek was quite without comprehen- 
sion of these things until his second spring. 
Then, suddenly, he too felt a longing to fly 
to the top of some stump and call. For his 
heart was swelling within him with a strange 
unrest, half joy, half longing, for he knew 
not what. That he had become a handsome 
bird he was well aware. And he strutted up 
and down every fallen log he came to in the 
warming sunshine, preening his feathers 
and sounding his harsh song. 

Then, one day, he spied a trim little brown 
hen pheasant watching him from behind a 
clump of jack-in-the-pulpits that here edged 
the swamp. And such a pretty bright-eyed 
creature he had never seen in all his life be- 
fore. For in her eyes there sparkled — ^yes — 
a distinct admiration for his own splendid 
person. He stood forth boldly in the morn- 
ing sunshine, preening his plumage with the 
pride that was his due, and watching out of 
the corner of his eye to see if she was taking 
it all in. 

She was ! His heart beat faster, and his 
veins raced with a strange new ecstasy. For 
103 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


this day had destiny called him ! He knew 
now why the first signs of spring had set him 
to singing the joy of life. 

She was coquettish, though. For every 
time he approached, she ran away and hid. 
His interest deepened. Wasn’t she a little 
flirt, though! (The demure brown thing!) 

But Krek, it would seem, was not her only 
admirer. For the next moment he found 
himself the center of a vortex, the rim of 
which seemed to be composed of spurs that 
cut into his sides and wings that flapped 
about his head. To his surprise he recog- 
nized his buddy of the winter-time, now ap- 
parently bent on his destruction. 

^‘You leave her alone,” the newcomer 
creaked at him, ruffling his feathers and 
jumping up and down in his rage. 

An even hotter fury took possession of 
Krek. Still slightly heavier than his foe, 
though less alert, he flew at this trespasser 
on his budding romance, thrusting at him 
with his own sharp spurs. Being of lighter 
build, the newcomer toppled over backwards, 
then took to the branch overhead and waited 
104 


Ruffling his feathers and jumping up and down in his rage 





THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


for a chance to drop on his antagonist from 
above. And because Krek was new to the 
game, he was taken by surprise by this 
counter move, and it was only by dint of 
sheer unwillingness to give in that he finally 
held the field. But by that time Brownie, 
the little hen, was gone! 

4. The Courtship 

The next day, however, she came again. 
But once more a former bunky disputed his 
claim on her, and again he fought. 

And so on for weeks ! It was enough to 
make one frantic, and he stalked about in a 
perpetual rage. There was but one consola- 
tion, — always Brownie’s bright eyes watched 
from some leafy covert, — ^watched victory 
after glorious victory, — ^though she always 
ran away when the fight was over. 

Truth to tell. Brownie was the queen of 
the roost that year, the very finest of the 
younger brood of hens, and desired of every 
gay Lothario from Mount Olaf to Rapid 
River. Krek meant to be king. 

Ah, but that was not so easy! One there 
105 


THE TRAVELS OP HONK-A-TONK 


was who had vanquished all comers, — one 
Hot Spur, a three-year-old of the most 
amazing agility and courage, and one who 
accordingly had things all his own way in 
the woods. 

That Brownie secretly preferred himself, 
Krek had no doubt in his heart of hearts. 
But it was most annoying to note her will- 
ingness to witness Hot Spur’s triumphs with 
apparently the same degree of interest she 
showed in his own. Doubtless her mother 
had instilled into her youthful mind the 
wisdom of picking the husband who could 
afford her the best protection from the perils 
of the forest. But that Hot Spur would 
offer her but a half-hearted devotion Krek 
well knew, from the philanderings he had 
seen the latter engage in with other hens. 

The spring days melted away, and so 
anxious had Krek become for fear Brownie 
should finally yield to the charms of the con- 
quering Hot Spur, and so filled became his 
feathery breast with rage at that same con- 
queror, that Krek actually could not eat. 
He went about in a sort of fever, darting 
106 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


angrily at every cock that crossed his path, 
— ^waiting, waiting, waiting ! 

Then one day it came, — the chance for 
which he had been preparing! And while 
Brownie lined up with three others of her 
ilk to watch, Krek and his foe drew spurs 
to see which of the two was hereafter to rule 
the woods, which was to have his pick of the 
pretty brown hens waiting bright-eyed to 
laud the victor, and which was hereafter to 
lead the younger flock. 

Now, Krek had the advantage of a slightly 
heavier body, for his early abundance of 
good food had given him a head start that 
he was never to outgrow. Hot Spur, on the 
other hand, was a more experienced bird and 
one who had had two seasons of battle to 
season his wits. 

For some time it was nip and tuck between 
them. Each gave as good as he got, and each 
got all he could stand. Their cries sounded 
harshly, and their feathers flew, as they dug 
at one another’s sides with their spurs, try- 
ing always for the head. By all the rules of 
the game, Krek would have been floored in 
107 


THE TRAVELS OF HONK-A-TONK 


the seventh round, if mere hurt were the 
only test. 

But back of all the pain, back of all the 
bewilderment of the whirlwind attack, his 
heart swelled with the pent-up longings 
which now made him aware that Brownie of 
the admiring eyes waited to crown the victor 
with her favor. 

Then, so suddenly that it left him claw- 
ing madly in the air, his antagonist had had 
enough, and ran bleeding into the hiding of 
the tall fern fronds. 

Krek was king of pheasantdom! 

This time Brownie did not run away, 
but called him with coquettish backward 
glances to go berrying with her while they 
considered nesting sites. 


THE END 

W 70 864 


108 



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